The SEC put forth a series of proposals it believes will enhance transparency, reduce asymmetries, and enhance public confidence in the equity markets but discussing these proposals in advance of releasing them in written form has raised significant confusion in the industry.

The Federal Reserve should lose its authority to bail out big, failing financial firms like AIG and Bear Stearns under proposed reforms aimed at limiting the collateral damage from such failures, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said. Geithner added in this video from the Wall Street Journal that the bankruptcy code should be the primary tool for failing financial institutions, but there might be some cases where a bail out would be necessary.

Bob Gasser, CEO, of ITG is testifying today before the Senate Subcommittee on Securities, Insurance, and Investment Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs on the topic of dark pools, flash orders, high frequency trading and other market structure issues.
His testimony can be read :
http://www.itg.com/news_events/Senate_Testimony_102809.pdf

Detractors claim that high frequency trading has a very risky profile and is capable of destabilizing the markets but Aldridge examines the risks of high-frequency trading in comparison with lower-frequency trading styles across every risk category.

At SIFMA’s Annual Meeting SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro announced that she has asked her staff to come up with two new market structure proposals focusing on sponsored exchange access and high frequency trading.

Datawatch's Monarch software, which converts reports to Excel spreadsheets, can now embed the original source document in the Excel file. Fraud examiner Phillip Levi says this should shorten and simplify internal fraud investigations.

Hearing that the alleged Raj Rajaratnam-led insider trading ring was detected using wiretaps and that the U.S. attorney for Manhattan, Preet Bharara, plans to employ the same kind of electronic surveillance for future Wall Street investigations, we were momentarily seized with the geeky desire to know how these wiretaps are performed. Are agents sneaking into offices and homes in the middle of the night to bug phones?

In a story in the Wall Street Journal's weekend edition, Donald J. Boudreaux, an economics professor at George Mason University, defended insider trading as a way to make markets work more efficiently and encourage investors to diversify.

And the saga continues. CNN's Chloe Melas reports on a recent lawsuit filed by former Madoff investors claiming that "Madoff's workplace was rife with cocaine and sex." The 264-page law suit claims Madoff "financed a cocaine-fueled work environment and a "culture of sexual deviance."" The complaint alleges Bernard Madoff Investment Services was known by insiders as the ""North Pole", in reference to the excessive amount of cocaine use in the work place." The law suit also
claims that "Madoff di